The expansion of private self-employment is one of the main economic measures implemented by the Cuban government since 2010 to update its socialist economy under a unique brand of “reform socialism.” State policies (a “push factor”), as well as economic incentives and the desire for greater economic independence (“pull factors”) have contributed to the remarkable growth of self-employment in Cuba since 2010. While employment in the state sector has declined significantly (13 percent) since 2010, self-employment has grown by more than 187 percent, and its share of total employment has increased from 3 percent to close to 9 percent. Despite these advances, Cuba’s self-employed workers face significant obstacles that limit their growth and potential economic contributions. In addition to addressing these challenges and obstacles, ensuring the success of Cuba’s self-employment reforms requires re-conceptualizing the state’s attitude toward self-employed workers and their potential contributions to economic development and growth.

Bildner Center for Western Hemisphere Studies, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York

This volume presents an analysis of the evolution and recent transformation of the sugar cane industry in Cuba from the fallout of sugar production during the Special Period to the creation of AZCUBA in 2011 to face new challenges; it also covers the potential use of sugar as energy and the behavior of the commodity within the global market economy.

The Cuban government has implemented a series of agricultural transformations since 2007 to increase the country’s agricultural self-sufficiency and reduce its dependency on food imports. These include the transfer (in usufruct) of State-owned land to non-State producers (e.g. cooperatives and private farmers), moderate price reforms, the decentralization of decision making, and the gradual relaxation of existing forms of agricultural commercialization.

As a result of these measures, the area planted, as well as physical output and agricultural yields (in selected non-sugar crop categories) have shown mixed results, but still remain below desired levels.

There are three (3) fundamental unresolved aspects that have prevented Cuba’s agricultural sector from achieving the desired outcomes: (1) the need to achieve the “realization of property,” (2) the recognition and acceptance of the market as a complementary economic coordination mechanism, and (3) the absence of a systemic focus to achieve the successful completion of the agricultural production cycle.

These unresolved aspects should be addressed through:

(1) the consolidation of input markets, where producers can obtain essential inputs at prices that correspond to the prices they can obtain for their output,

(2) greater autonomy to allow agricultural producers to freely decide when, where, and to whom they could sell their output, after social contracts have been fulfilled,

(3) the diversification of the forms of agricultural commercialization to permit greater participation by non-State economic actors,

Washington’s “new course on Cuba” presents a new set of challenges, opportunities and new prospects for the Island’s emerging self-employed workers. There are several reasons for this:

1. Despite existing constraints and limitations, policy contradictions, and the predominance of bureaucratic economic coordination mechanisms and centralized planning, the expansion of self-employment is one of the principal elements of Cuba’s efforts to “update” its economic model.

2.The implementation of a series of reform policy changes in Cuba since 2007, and particularly after 2010, have contributed to the rapid expansion of self-employment and its growing share of total employment (Figure 1).

While limited openings to allow the expansion of self-employment are not a new phenomenon in the Cuban economy, the number of legally-registered self-employed workers has grown significantly since 2007.

Self-employment has grown at an even faster rate since 2010, when the Cuban government announced its plan to reduce its bloated State payrolls by 20% and after 2011 when the number of authorized self-employment categories was increased to 201.

The number of self-employed workers grew 206.6% from 138,400 in 2007 to 424,300 in 2013. By contrast, employment in the State sector fell 10.1% between 2007 and 2013, and employment in cooperatives declined 6.2% during the same period.

While the State sector accounted for 82.9% of total employment in 2007, this figure fell to 73.7% in 2013. Self-employed workers represented 2.8% of total employment in 2007, but their share of total employment grew to 8.6% in 2013.

Most self-employed workers in Cuba, however, are presently employed in relatively low-skilled (service-oriented) activities. They also face a wide range of legal prohibitions that limit their ability to grow and achieve economies of scale and their potential contributions to the country’s development and economic growth.

3. Despite facing strict State-imposed controls and limitations, self-employment has contributed to job creation, the provision of goods and services that were insufficiently produced by the State, and increases in the State’s tax revenues; it has also contributed to changes in attitudes, perceptions, and relationships between a growing segment of the Cuban population and the State, leaving a lasting “footprint” on the Cuban economy.

4. Since the limited liberalization of self-employment and the legalization of the U.S. dollar in 1993, self-employed workers have been among the principal recipients of remittances from abroad, particularly from the Cuban community in the United States, directly serving as one of the principal mechanisms to strengthen transnational ties between both countries.

While self-employment expanded significantly (206.6%), and its share of total employment increased notably during the 2007-2013 period, it has grown at a much slower rate, following the initial spurt experienced in 2011. This can be primarily attributed to existing restrictions on the types of self-employment activities that are currently authorized, excessive State regulation and intervention, the inexistence of input markets where self-employed workers and micro-entrepreneurs can obtain essential inputs at competitive prices in Cuban pesos (CUP), onerous taxation, and the remaining ambivalence of the State’s policies and attitudes towards the self-employed.

Cuba’s self-employed workers also have to contend with a dilapidated infrastructure, excessive bureaucratic constraints, insufficient sources of funding (excluding remittances), logistical difficulties do to the existence of primitive (quasi-formal) supply chains, government restrictions regarding the accumulation of capital (or concentration of wealth), and limited property rights. In addition, they lack access to mobile payment platforms, advanced (computerized) accounting and transactions (or sales) recording systems, and modern procurement and purchasing systems.

In terms of market segment concentration, it is worth noting that a notable share of self-employed workers is engaged in tourist-oriented activities such as food services (servicios de gastronomía), lodging or hospitality (alquileres), and transportation. Many of these depend on remittances from abroad as a primary source of working capital, and the majority of their client base consists of tourists and foreign visitors. Primarily catering to a limited (albeit affluent) market segment, rather than to a wider strata of the Cuban population, limits their market share and opportunities for growth and expansion.

Despite facing these challenges and limitations, the number self-employed workers in Cuba continues to expand (albeit at a slower pace in recent years), demonstrating the resilience of the entrepreneurial spirit that has historically characterized a significant portion of the Island’s population.

Given the growing importance of self-employment in the Cuban economy in recent years, the strong transnational linkages between a significant portion of self-employed workers and their friends and relatives in the United States, new U.S. policies towards Cuba are likely to impact this key sector of the Cuban economy in several ways:

Continued expansion of self-employment activities, including new more value-added categories.

Improved access to credit and equity capital to finance small-scale private business ventures.

Opening to foreign investment, including partnerships with Cubans residing abroad.

Future expansion of firm size, scope, and areas of operations.

Greater share of total employment and contribution to Gross Domestic Product (GDP), tax payments, and social security system contributions.

Adoption of modern point of sales (POS) systems, accounting systems, and inventory anagement systems to track sales and report business operations (and thereby improve the State’s ability to collect taxes from microenterprises and self-employed workers).

Despite all the potential (positive) effects of the new US policy approach with regards to self-employment, their real impact “on the front lines” depends on whether or not the Cuban government has the political will to implement deeper reform measures that will reduce the monopoly of the State, while permitting the expansion of the private sector by eliminating the “internal embargo.” On the economic front, this can be accomplished by lifting the internal restrictions, excessive regulations, onerous taxation, and bureaucratic limitations imposed by the State on the self-employed. On the political front, this process would require a radical shift in the State’s perceptions and attitudes towards the self-employed, recognizing Cuba’s emerging entrepreneurial class not only as a source of tax revenue for the State, but as primarily as a an engine of job creation, wealth formation, and the economic growth and development.

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*Mario A. González-Corzo, Associate Professor, Department of Economics and Business, LEHMAN COLLEGE, City University of New York (CUNY), and is a Research Associate, Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies (ICCAS), University of Miami

This paper examines the evolution of Cuba’s self-employed entrepreneurs since the sector became an officially-recognized alternative to State sector employment in 2010. Despite the expansion of authorized self-employment activities and the implementation of gradual economic reforms to “update” the country’s socialist economic model since 2010, Cuba’s emerging self-employed entrepreneurs still face a series of constraints and limitations, such as an onerous tax system, underdeveloped banking and financial sectors, lack of access to organized input markets and a still hostile business climate that hinder their ability to expand and contribute to the country’s economic growth.

Orlando Justo is in the Department of Economics and Business, City University of New York (CUNY), Lehman College, Carman Hall, 377, 250 Bedford Park Boulevard West, Bronx, NY 10468, USA

Mario Gonzalez Corzo (Ph.D. Rutgers University) is Associate Professor at the Department of Economics at Lehman College (CUNY). He is also Faculty Fellow at the Bildner Center for Western Hemisphere Studies at The Graduate Center, CUNY, and a Research Associate at the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami, FL. His research interests and areas of specialization include Cuba’s post-Soviet economic developments, agricultural reforms, entrepreneurship, and financial sector reforms in post-socialist transition economies.

The proceedings of the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy’s 23rd Annual Meeting entitled “Reforming Cuba?” (August 1–3, 2013) is now available. The presentations have now been published by ASCEat http://www.ascecuba.org/.

The presentations are listed below and linked to their sources in the ASCE Web Site.